Amelia Andersdotter of Sweden's Pirate Party (Piratpariet) will finally become the youngest ever member of the European Parliament this December. [more inside]
posted by jeffburdges on Nov 25, 2011 - 19 comments

Swedish "Pirate" MEP Christian Engström has announced that today or tomorrow Europe will be voting on extending copyrights for recorded music from 50 years to 95 years.

Recently, Engström and Dutch liberal party D66 MEP Marietje Schaake have submitted a formal question to the European Commission on the conflict of interest arising from their appointment of Maria Martin-Prat. Martin-Prat has spent years directing 'global legal policy' for IFPI, the global recording industry's London-based trade group, but will now be overseeing IPRED and the ongoing ACTA proposals (previously).

On the other side of the pond, Judge Beryl Howell has overturned restrictions established by lower courts on the issuing mass subpoenas to ISPs during her first week on the U.S. D.C. District Court (previously, known results). Beryl Howell was recently employed as an RIAA lobbyist and Executive Managing Director and General Counsel at the pirate chasing company Stroz Friedberg.
posted by jeffburdges on Apr 11, 2011 - 211 comments

Every January 1 is Public Domain Day, when new authors enter the public domain. Copyright law is "fiendishly complex", but using the generic "life plus seventy" rule, here are some of the authors who enter the public domain today. What could have been entering the public domain today under the pre-1978-era law (Fellowship of the Ring, Dr. Seuss, etc..).. but you can expect further endless extensions of copyright to come. More articles here, here.
posted by stbalbach on Jan 1, 2011 - 115 comments

RestoftheMovie.com will probably be taken offline pretty soon, since it seems like they show full (screener) versions of current movies (like Kung Fu Panda and Ironman) in streaming format, so you'll probably want to check it out sooner rather than later.
posted by Dave Faris on Jun 12, 2008 - 34 comments

The leader of the Swedish Pirate Party explaining how the US went bankrupt in 1971, and has been covering it up through an accelerating whack-a-mole borrowing frenzy that is bursting right now. [more inside]
posted by blasdelf on Mar 22, 2008 - 121 comments

The Pirate Party^ has become a significant voice in Swedish politics, partly due to the illegal raids on the Pirate Bay^ and The Bureau of Piracy (Piratbyrån)^ (which spawned both). Other Swedish political parties are now adding copyright reforms to their platforms. The party's leader Rickard Falkvinge^ gave an intelligent compelling interview "today".
Note: Virtually all major content industries today are the result of large scale piracy or flagrant patent infringement, including the American publishing industry, Hollywood, radio, and the music industry. And the anti-piracy side has essentially no historical evidence supporting its position.
posted by jeffburdges on Jun 20, 2006 - 40 comments